Life Sucks! The Claymore Side
by insertappropropriatenamehere
Summary: What do several ex-Claymores do in a modern era that no longer needs them? They survive and protect their 'secret' identities and pasts, of course! Chapter 3: Helen and Deneve make a little bet near Pieta...
1. Chapter 1

Spinoff of Useful Oxymoron's fic 'Life Sucks'. Told from the viewpoint of numerous ex-Claymores. Pre-fanfic.

Summary: The Claymores find out that someone has been digging up their pasts and selling their 'artifacts' to a museum, and they must 'deal' with the incident before it gets out of hand and they are exposed. 

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Chapter 1: Museum Trip

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Cynthia fiddled with her pigtails nervously.

"Hello," the woman sitting next to her said offhandedly. Cynthia turned to face her. "Oh, you have silver eyes! How beautiful!"

Just then, a crash and a scream were heard from beyond the office door and Ophelia stormed out, looking annoyed beyond belief and cursing out her interviewer.

"Umm, miss?" Ophelia flashed the speaker a Look; the timid secretary and everyone else squeaked and backed away from her.

"What did you do this time, 'Rippling' Ophelia?" Cynthia asked quietly.

"I threw the jerk out the window," Ophelia replied confidently. Car tires squealed on the pavement outside. "Here's my ride. Good luck, weakling."

"You know her?" Cynthia looked around. Oh, great. Now everyone was looking at her oddly, too.

"We've met." _Barely_. Cynthia wished she could just claim Claymore immunity and stalk off, but she didn't even have her sword with her. It was at home, sitting in a bag where it awaited shipping.

"I'm afraid no one else can be interviewed today," the secretary said apologetically. "Please come back next week."

Dark mutterings arose from the assembled women, and several sent Cynthia dirty looks as if blaming her.

"We're not related or even acquaintances," she demurred. Sometimes, she hated the fact that all Claymores looked alike. It was entirely the Organization's fault, not that the Organization was still around.

Of course, organized bureaucratic government more than made up for that. Cynthia got up and filed out the door.

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Looking out the window, Tabitha spotted a laptop on sale. Oh, good. She could replace her old one, which was bulky, slow and several decades old. As she entered the store, she noticed a show on. It involved women with breast implants fighting lame monsters in badly fitted rubber costumes and seemed to be popular, as everyone was crowded around it and seemed to be engrossed. Her sharp eyes caught the name of the show easily enough.

She rubbed her eyes carefully, but the text remained the same.

…Power Claymores?

Slightly outranged and amused, she turned to see another Claymore from the post-Pieta days.

"Cynthia?"

"Tabitha?"

"You realize this show is a travesty, right?"

"It is popular entertainment, so a correct rendering of facts is not required. Still, it is a travesty."

Tabitha quickly paid for her laptop and left. There was going to be a new topic on Clare and Helen's forum tonight.

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Clare wondered briefly if she could get everyone else to pitch in and perhaps buy an island together where they could pretty much ignore the modern world.

"Wouldn't be a good idea," Ophelia replied. Clare glared at her partner. "We'd be better off taking over the world."

"That's impossible," Clare pointed out.

"Exactly." Ophelia turned on the channel and cursed. "What the fuck?"

"What?"

"Somebody found Claymore swords and the Organization's files, and they're on display at the local museum. There's now a big controversy and they're trying to figure out if this is a hoax."

The television flashed images of the various oversized claymores, each one in almost pristine condition. Several pages of the Organization's ledgers and records were next. And then-

"That's Raki's sword from Rabona!"

The phone rang.

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"I'm so glad Isley's incognito in some third-world nation," Miria said. "He's got no way of knowing that one of the blades they're showing is his."

"Really?" Tabitha leaned forward. "Oh, hey. It really is! And that's Audrey's!"

"Let's not put it on Clare's new forum," Cynthia said. "I'm calling Helen and Deneve."

"Aren't they doing that antique roadshow?" Tabitha asked, confused.

"Exactly."

The screen changed. A familiar-looking young woman with silver eyes, pale skin, and white-blonde hair appeared, arguing that Claymores did not and had never existed based on historical knowledge.

"Isn't that Yuma?"

"Oh, she's defusing the situation," Miria said. "Good."

"That's her phone number!" Helen's voice screamed from the phone. '202 894-4289'! Call her, Deneve! Call her!" _Click_.

On screen, Yuma's phone rang.

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Jean wandered around, occasionally helping the nice rice farmers. She was helping a village doctor named Lai Po Suk Shen when her phone rang.

"Hello?"

"JEAN!" It was Helen.

"This is she."

"The news! Watch the news!"

"…I have no access to a television, nor will I for another few years."

"Youtube! Search Youtube!"

"What's so important?"

"Our secret's out!"

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Undine wandered around in the sewers, flashing her oversized muscles at anyone stupid enough to try to mug her. Or maybe they were just sewer workers who cared for her well-being. Either way, it didn't matter.

She could feel an Awakened Being ahead. She confirmed her suspicions when a terrified-looking, decapitated human head still wearing the standard sewage worker hardhat flew out and hit the wall behind her.

Opposite that, a dripping sign written in fresh blood stated, 'Welcome to the Lair of the Great Awakened Being Bloody Agatha'.

Undine dodged a tentacle and sent out a wave of youma energy, the equivalent of a secret, silent 'Claymore here!'

A naked woman with red hair and no eyebrows walked out. "Name, class, and former rank?"

"Undine, Rank 11, Class 77. Kiss my ass, loser."

"I'm the former Number 2, you know." Undine could see a large, spiderlike thing move in the shadows beyond.

"It can't be comfortable, lying on bones, concrete, and old shit. And that's why you're a loser. Go hide from the world so they don't have to see your sorry ass."

"Bitch," Agatha muttered. Undine hightailed it out of there as long tentacles began destroying that particular section of the sewer walls.

"Can't catch me! Nyah nyah!"

"DIE!!"

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Yuma sat nervously, staring out the plane's small, round window. Even after her efforts, numerous people still believed in Claymores. In fact, the plane was transporting all her dead colleagues' swords and the Organization's personal records.

Maybe if the plane crashed, there would be nothing le- Holy shit.

Was that Agatha she just saw?

And an overly muscled Goth ex-Claymore flipping her off?

Then Agatha's tentacles hit the plane's engines, forcing the Awakened Being to disengage most of her winged-spider faux body as the high-speed propellers shredded it to pieces and then promptly blow up from the stress of trying to maul incredibly hard Awakened body 'armor'.

Agatha smirked. Only Dauf's armor was harder. Even Isley's didn't quite match up. Not that the crazy monster centaur needed it, anyways.

And a few milliseconds later, two ex-Claymores and an Awakened Being went splat on the formerly pristine landscape just outside the city.

"Ow," Yuma said, dragging herself from the wreckage and deciding her legs were too mangled to be salvaged.

"What the fuck was a weakling like you doing?" Undine demanded, sitting down on something that turned out to be soft, squishy, and… naked.

"You should pay for sitting on my lovely breasts," Agatha grumbled.

"We just got a plane to destroy most of your body," Undine pointed out. "Now we get to pick up the ground meat and hide it."

"I'm not faking my death," Yuma said. "Last time, they gave me an _autopsy_. It was terrible. The coroner was a necrophile."

The three of them gazed at the wreckage of the plane. "Look around, dipshit," Undine scolded. "Do you honestly think they'll even be able to figure out who's who? They'll probably think Agatha's burned bits are yours."

The pleasant aroma of grilled meat floated by.

"Dingleheimer," Agatha grumbled. "That's my body you're dissing."

Yuma began poking around for the claymores.

"Here's yours," Undine said, tossing the sword at her head. Yuma stuck it in the ground and began searching. "How many were there?"

"Twenty three. The Organization's records should be destroyed by now, but we'll bury those claymores."

And so, what little remained of the Organization and its Claymores vanished into the depths of history.

When that happened, people became immensely interested in the subject and 'Power Claymores' became an extremely popular show.

The plane crash got blamed on UFOs, since something odd, round, and flying had been seen crashing into the plane just before it crashed, and some of the less-than-charred Agatha bits were found to contain some weird sort of semi-DNA.

Imagine.

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Undine walked down the street. Someone was talking about the 'White Witch' from the book of some idiot named Lewis.

Idiots.

Nowadays, people thought Claymores were sexy, friendly women who got along, worked in groups, and were determined to do good and beloved by the people, given some kind of power of goodness to fight off youma and their 'Awakened Being bosses', with the occasional evil Abyssal overlord thrown into the mix.

Nothing could be farther than the truth.

Except maybe the fact that Priscilla was alive. (Which she wasn't, for which everyone was thankful)

Undine walked through the masses of people frightened at her odd, threatening appearance and smirked.

Humans.

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End of Chapter 1.

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Explanation: Yuma's phone number's area code, 202, is the area code for Washington, D.C. It's what you dial if you want to harass the Senate. (Please don't. They tend to track you down and then do the most annoying thing possible during the most inconvenient time possible at the most inconvenient place possible.)

Dr. Lai Po Suk Shen is from a political cartoon about Chinese medicine I saw on www . naturenews . com. Lovely site.

Agatha chased Undine all around the sewers and finally out the drainage pipe. Some city now has no working toilets.

Yuma was the sole survivor of the plane crash. Everyone else burned to death, including the Organization's records. The Claymores' blades are made out of something incredibly strong and probably also fire-resistant, so they're fine. Yuma regenerated her legs and helped the other two bury them.

Youma flesh gets put into girl. Youma DNA merges with girl's DNA. Girl turns into Claymore. Claymore Awakens. Youma DNA completely morphs girl's DNA, creating some mutant strain. Not that people know what youma DNA is anymore. As Useful Oxymoron decided, youma don't exist any longer.

The 'White Witch' is from the Narnia series. The author is 'C.S. Lewis'. Thank you, Useful Oxymoron, for reminding me. (Gawd it's been a long time since I've thought about them…)

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Up next: Eating Babies


	2. Chapter 2

I have to write a DBQ due tomorrow. It's actually quite late.

Hence, why I'm ignoring a huge percentage of my grade and typing this.

Summary: Ophelia reads a short story and takes things a little too far.

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Chapter 2: Eating Babies

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Humans were weird, Ophelia decided, reading something entitled 'A Modest Proposal' by some idiot named Jonathan Swift.

Who advocated eating babies? Granted, most of the Claymores had at one point or another eaten young animals, but never human. It went against the creed the Organization had locked into their brains; humans are untouchable. Unless you want to die.

Ophelia had a sudden desire to try human.

"I want to eat babies," she said suddenly. Clare, who was sitting next to her and reading some romance novel or another, fell off the couch.

"Are you sure you haven't Awakened yet?" she asked concernedly. "After all, there was that time at that one lake up in Finland-"

"That was a long time ago!" Ophelia argued. "Besides, I still have silver eyes! Why don't we go to some third world country where they're holding a genocide or something. I heard Rwanda's gotten pretty bloodly lately. We can invite Isley!"

"He's already down there," Clare said, sitting back down on the couch and flipping the page. "Helen saw him and Jean down there."

"_Jean_?" Ophelia asked, scandalized. "What's he doing with Jean?"

"Going out?" Clare flipped another page. "Where would you get the babies?"

"The Hutu are getting massacred by the thousands," Ophelia said unconcernedly. "The Tutsi can spare a few."

"Right." Clare set the book down. "Let's fly to Sudan instead, since I really don't want to meet up with Isley. I heard there's another genocide at Darfur. Dinka babies are probably bigger or something, since the people are so tall."

"Darfur it is!" Ophelia chirped. "Let's go!"

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Down in Rwanda, Isley and Jean sneezed. Twice.

"I wonder who's talking about us?" Isley wondered.

"Either Helen and Deneve or Ophelia and Clare," Jean replied. "They're the only Claymores who are still paired up. And since Helen and Deneve already know, it's probably Ophelia and Clare."

"If they weren't offensive type warriors, I'd shoot them," Isley said regretfully. He sneezed again, violently, spraying Awakened mucus all over his only shirt, which promptly disintegrated. "On the other hand, I might just shoot them anyways."

"Corrosive snot?" Jean asked dryly. "That's fairly odd."

"At least it's not corrosive spit, like Luciela of the South's was."

"True. I like your kisses." And they promptly went back to business, ignoring the machine guns firing somewhere to their left.

A pair of artillery shells hit each other directly overhead, providing a fairly spectacular, if macabre and monochrome, set of fireworks.

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The Claymore formerly known as 'Quicksword Irene' stumbled out of a bush, adjusting her giant sword.

"What on earth?" The village had been ravaged fairly well, and there were no survivors. "Humans. Who needs youma nowadays?" She looked around, disgusted, and kept on walking.

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Claire and Ophelia left the plane, feeling slightly ill.

"I am never riding a DC-10 anymore," Clare said.

"A what?"

"They're said to have the highest crash rate of all commercial airliners. Somehow, they're still in use."

"Like the one behind us? The crash that incinerated a good section of the _Playboy_ staff?"

Clare nodded. "That one."

"I'm so glad we didn't get on."

"I told you it wasn't our flight."

"Shut up. Let's go find some dead babies."

Clare shook her head and followed Ophelia.

They had been walking south by southeast- whatever that meant- for several days and had come upon a single village. Sadly, for the time being, the village seemed to be peacefully coexisting.

That image was shattered one sunny market day- with Ophelia claiming it was too damn hot, even for a Claymore- when a group of men armed with Sudanese government-issue weapons and riding an odd mix of horses, camel, and trucks rolled in and promptly began shooting. The two Claymores were taken completely by surprise.

"Ow," Ophelia grunted, fishing around in her abdomen for several lead shots. "Stupid bastards."

"For once, I agree," Clair assented, probing her shoulder for a 9 mm round.

"What do you mean, 'for once'?" Ophelia grumbled as she finally fished out a blood-darkened ball and threw it at the man who had shot her, embedding it deep into his forehead. As he toppled over, obviously dead, the others took notice of them.

"What on earth are you two doing here?" a familiar voice asked. "I thought you would have sense enough to avoid trouble spots like these."

"Irene?" Clare gaped. "You're alive!"

"Would I be talking to you if I weren't?" Irene sent an aristocratic glare at the rest of the muhadijeen, who cowered behind their weapons. The horses and lone camel took it in their heads to run away from the predatory human-beast thing and left their owners behind. "By the way, if you see a Dinka Malwal boy named Francis Piol Bol Buk, please inform his older brother in the village up north that he is alive and well, preferably by shoving them face-to-face."

Claire shifted quietly but said nothing.

"We were looking for dead babies," Ophelia offered cheerily.

"She just finished reading Jonathan Swift's 'A Modest Proposal'," Clare explained. "It's a long story."

Irene stared at Ophelia. "Dead babies. Are you sure you haven't Awakened? There was that lake in Finland-"

"Of course not!" Ophelia complained, outraged. "That was only a partial Awakening! I still look like one of the Organization's soldiers, don't I?"

"Red Cross here," a sweet lady in a nurse's uniform chirped, driving a truck at the head of a convoy.

As the locals swarmed around the red and white trucks, the muhadijeen shifted nervously and departed silently.

Clare, Ophelia, and Irene watched as the Red Cross people began doling out food and medical supplies. They were protected by a U.N. military convoy and were towing along a college class. Their familiar-looking professor was dictating on the Darfur genocide and its global impact in international socioeconomic policies and thus the foreign policies of most other nations, since all were bound by the U.N. covenant.

"Is that Yuma?" Clare asked.

"Do you have any idea what she's saying?" Ophelia retorted.

"She's explaining the Darfur genocide's impact on global politics, economics, and moral standings," one of the college students said, coming over. "Professor Yuma's so smart! By the way, are you related to her?"

"No!" Clare protested.

"Hell no!" Ophelia agreed.

"Of course not," Irene said. "We look nothing alike." _By Claymore standards, anyways._ The college student looked unconvinced.

"Right. Well, my name's Therese, so have a good day." The college student walked back to her group, leaving behind a slightly poleaxed Clare.

"Hey, doesn't she look a lot like Teresa of the Faint Smile- hey!" Clare had fainted dead away. Ophelia and Irene hurried to catch her before she could distract everyone. Yuma was moving on from the French parliament to the Vietnam countryside. How she had gone from Darfur to the French parliament neither of the two other conscious Claymores was certain, but Irene suspected it had something to do with globalization and the advent of modern-day mercantilism.

Ophelia had no clue what the other Claymores were spouting.

"No dead babies here," Clare muttered quietly. Ophelia nodded and they walked away quietly.

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A few days later, the pair walked into another village.

"Dead baby," Ophelia announced, pulling one out of a pile of the dead piled up in the center of a ravaged village. "Fresh, too."

"We just ate," Clare grumbled. "We can't refrigerate it for two weeks, either."

"Dried baby, then."

"Sure."

And soon, there were strips of dead baby jerky around.

And they got around to telling dead baby jokes.

"Hey, Clare, how do you get twenty dead babies into a jar?" Ophelia asked, poking their small campfire with a stick.

"Dunno. How?" Clare stretched.

"With a blender!" The Claymores laughed. "How do you get them out again?"

"Chips!" Clare snorted. "Dead babies. Seriously. You aren't gonna eat one, are you? After all, it's so much like cannibalism."

"Nah," Ophelia announced. "I'm gonna give them to Isley. Or maybe Agatha."

"Agatha," Clare said. "She deserves it, poor Awakened One. Can't really adapt to a human-dominated world."

"That's her fault," Ophelia grumbled, but she assented. "Agatha it is. What's Undine's address?"

"Dunno. We'll just give it to Agatha when we see her next, I guess." Clare shrugged. "Hey, what's worse than a dead baby?"

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Agatha nursed her poor hair as she considered her lair. She would have to repaint her sign….

Was that a split end? Damn airplane propellers!

And someone was telling 'Yo' Momma' jokes in the newly rebuilt sewers. These places were terrible for echoes.

She was definitely going to kill who came in.

"-and yo' momma's so bad she looks to mine as a role model!" a Claymore with a braid was saying to one with short hair. Something jogged in Agatha's mind… Clare!

"What are you doing here?" Agatha screamed.

"We come bearing gifts!" Clare screamed back, shoving a package into her hands.

"Bitch!" Ophelia roared, setting off a few sonic waves. In the ensuing silence, the water crept quietly back down the drainage pipes and a few chunks of masonry fell down from the force of the sound directly onto Agatha's new body.

The other two just stared at Ophelia in awe.

"That's a new dimension to 'Rippling Ophelia'," Clare said appreciatively. "Just don't do that in bed."

Ophelia whacked her partner on the head. "We're going now, Awakened loser! Bye!"

Watching the Claymores walk away, Agatha narrowed her eyes. She was going to get revenge in the cruelest and most unusual way possible the next time she met them. Absently, she untied the package.

"Dead baby?" she wondered, confused, before biting down on a strip and using the nutrition to begin rebuilding her Awakened body. "Tastes like chicken."

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AN: This is true. Please be careful when you fly. The Playboy incident is true, too. Source: Deep Survival (copyright 2003), Laurence Gonzales.

Francis Piol Bol Buk, now officially known as Francis Fioul Bol Bok (due to a misprint on his illegal Sudanese passport) is one of the leading activists of the campaign to stop the genocide at Darfur. He works with iAbolish and is a former slave. He has an autobiography, _Escape from Slavery_, detailing everything. It's a fairly good read.

As for the French parliament and the Vietnam countryside, the French got involved in (aka started) the Vietnam War while trying to protect their holdings from a grassroots (quite literally) Communist revolution. They were losing pretty badly since the North Vietnamese were guerilla fighters and used the jungles against them, so they called on the nation with the strongest army in the world (supposedly)- their friends the U.S. The U.S. got involved and the rest is history.

The dead baby jokes are just dead baby jokes. I like to think of the Claymores as having a rather morbid sense of humor.

By the way, I have no idea what dead baby tastes like.

New Chapter: Helen of Troy


	3. Chapter 3

Hello. Chapter Three here. I will answer all the questions that may or may not be lingering in your mind after the first two chapters. Oh, and I forgot:

Disclaimer: All I own is artistic license.

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Chapter 3: Helen of Troy

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"I dare you-" Deneve began.

"NOOOO!" Helen wailed, clutching her hat tighter to her head. Deneve pulled out Helen's old uniform- the parts that remained, anyways. Mostly, that was just the silvery armor and the stretchy black cloth that seemed virtually indestructible. Helen suspected it was either made of old youma or a primitive carbon nanotube fiber.

"If you win I'll do the same thing," Deneve offered.

Helen perked up slightly, her interest peaked. Mentally, she ignored Woolloomooloo's warning never to bet with Deneve. "What is it?"

"Go to the ski resort over Pieta, dress up in your old uniform, and scream 'WAAAHHH! My precious comrades! I, Helen, am back to mourn for your tragic loss to the invasion from so long ago, when they leveled this beautiful city!' while crying, wailing, and otherwise acting grief-stricken," Deneve said. "In the meantime, Cynthia, Tabitha, Miria, and I will be filming this to put on the forums. We're also going to investigate to see what happened to the swords at Pieta, since Yuma doesn't know what happened to them."

"Oh, Jean's looking for the alloy so we can recreate our own swords," Helen remembered. "Especially since all the other ones were destroyed by the plane crash. Undine wants her friend's sword back, too."

"And they never thought to check in Pieta?"

"Nope."

Deneve sweatdropped. "How lame." She pulled out a long wig of a shade identical to Helen's fuzz. "Your hair's too short."

Helen picked up the wig and tried it on. Amazingly, it fit pretty well. "I look like Galatea," she deadpanned.

"Mmm hmm," Deneve said, sewing some kind of neo-Greek short robe-thing. "Since we don't have the rest of your uniform, you're going to be wearing this."

"Do I get underwear, too?" Helen asked dryly. Deneve pointed to a lacy black thong.

Helen sweatdropped. "Right."

(insert line break here) 

Several days later, a group of blonde, silver-eyed model types congregated in the ski resort's café. Lying in their ski bags were four shovels that Miria had brought from somewhere, yellow construction hard hats, and caution tape. Helen adjusted her overcoat, shifting her pauldrons into a more comfortable position, then waited for night to fall as she sipped her twelve-dollar latte.

"Who's paying?" she asked casually, adjusting the fit of her short, strapless dress.

"Yuma can't join us, but she's funding this with the proceeds from her new book. It's all planned out so that if anyone tries to track us, it looks like we've hacked into her account," Miria said, nursing her own ten-dollar hot chocolate. "And since we've spent almost a hundred dollars on overpriced drinks alone, that's a good thing."

Cynthia shook her head. "Clare and Ophelia count themselves lucky if they can make that much in a day."

"Right, so now we know who to sponge off of," Deneve said.

"What are you losers doing here?" a Goth Claymore asked.

The group stared at Undine. "What are you doing here?" Miria asked.

Undine smirked. "Deneve posted your undertaking on the forum, and Yuma and Isley are currently putting up protective firewalls so no government agencies can hack in until the thread goes down."

"You didn't answer her question," Deneve said, 'accidentally' spilling her drink over Undine's front. Luckily, it was just water.

"You'll pay for that, loser," Undine swore, wringing out her front. "Besides, I came to help you. I want my friend's claymore back."

"Who was your friend?" Deneve asked.

"Go ask the loch ness monster," Undine replied rudely, dragging over a chair and sitting on it, propping her snow-laden, booted feet on the table. Helen and Tabitha moved their drinks somewhere in less danger of contamination. Tabitha continued her cell phone chat with Jean, unabated.

"Ophelia knows?" Miria asked.

"What?" Undine asked, confused.

"Oh, you didn't know?" Deneve said. "I thought it was common knowledge." Undine snarled. "A not so long time ago, bird flew by while Clare and Ophelia were on vacation at a picnic in a lake in Finland and crapped all over Ophelia's sandwich. Ophelia lost her temper, chased the bird, and nearly Awakened again. Some idiot of a photographer was passing by and took her picture. Luckily, Clare managed to knock him out and convince him he was in Canada."

"She didn't take his camera?" Undine asked.

"Nope. It was digital; he'd already passed it on before Clare could corner him and ship them overseas by express mail. Ophelia still manages to laugh whenever anyone brings the incident up. But then, she's almost like an Awakened Being, anyways."

"It helps that the year following, some cartographers managed to find the remnants of Ophelia's first near-Awakening in some lake in Canada. You know, the one where Clare used the Quicksword to slice her to pieces?"

Undine nodded. "And no one posted this on the forum?"

"It _was_ posted," Tabitha said quietly. "That was in the early days, before we managed to contact you."

Undine winced. "Oh." It hadn't helped that everyone had thought her dead back at Pieta. Or Jean, for that matter. (Eight year sleep, anyone?) "That reminds me."

"If it's violent, wait until after this mission," Miria said. "Even as the former number six, I'm the highest ranking."

Helen sneezed, rapidly crunching numbers in her head…. Miria was number 6, then came Undine at 11, Cynthia at 14 and Deneve at 15, Tabitha was 31 and she was 22. "Dammit!"

"What, loser?"

"I'm the second lowest rank here!"

"Haha! Loser!"

"Stop attracting attention, Undine," Miria scolded. "All right. Where are you staying?"

Undine stared at her. "Are you kidding me? Everything else here's so expensive I had patch together a cardboard box!"

There was a moment of silence.

"Bah. Can't stand closed rooms, anyways. Remind me of being buried for eight-odd years. Those youma energy suppressants back then were something."

There were polite coughs around the table. Passersby stared at the odd group, probably because most of them were wearing T-shirts and jeans. Miria was even wearing flip flops. That a good majority of them were nursing iced drinks wasn't common, either.

Undine grabbed the nearest waiter, who choked and massaged his now bruised throat. "What?" he squeaked.

"Ham sandwich. And ice water. Snowmelt-cold. Move it." As the waiter scuttled off, the other Claymores stared at her. "What?"

"Now he'll spit in your food. At least order something exotic if you're going to be here," Deneve said. "This is a one-in-a-lifetime chance to try something new and you order a ham sandwich?"

"Bitch," Undine grumbled, grabbing her sandwich from the waiter and throwing the plate at his head. "I like ham sandwiches."

"Hey, I heard Ophelia's got some masochistic chefs," Helen said. "Isley posted it up when he and Jean went to eat there."

"Really?" Helen shifted uncomfortably. "When do I go? I miss wearing a bra, and my spaulders are killing me."

"Tonight at six," Deneve said. "When everyone's going to be outside eating."

"You really want people to watch this, don't you?" Helen grumbled, staring down at her coffee mix and momentarily considering 'accidentally' dumping it down Deneve's front. But no, that would be in bad taste, and Deneve would probably do something even messier in retaliation. Being able to regenerate fully from any mess tended to change one's outlook on life.

**(insert line break here)**

Helen handed her coat to Miria, took a deep breath, and cracked her back. Before her, the ski slope, the most popular one in the entire resort and the most visible from both the stylized village, dropped. Stepping firmly on and crushing the already packed snow, Helen walked into plain view.

A pair of hidden searchlights focused on her. _Damn Deneve…. she planned this for a long time. Ever since the resort was built, probably. _Helen fiddled with her miniature microscope, found where the (once again) hidden speakers were located, and let loose with a tormented wail she had last heard from a Claymore Riful had been torturing to death.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!"

The lodge burst into action, and Helen paused to listen to the echoes of her youki- and speaker-enhanced voice bounce back from the surrounding mountains.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!"

This was fun! She lengthened her vocal cords into a much deeper- but still recognizably feminine- voice.

"MY COOOOMRAAAADES… MYYYYY BEEEAAAUUUTIFUUUUUL CIIITYYYYY…"

Deneve and the others had snuck off with reinforced shovels already. Helen focused on making a spectacular scene. Of course, the sight of a model-thin, stunning-by-modern-standards woman in burnished, silvery-white armor and a short white _kyten_ was also spectacular. Helen swore even the snow was sparkling around her. Although considering Deneve's tendencies, it probably was. She repitched her voice and continued.

"IIIII, HEEEEELEEEN, HAAAAVE COOOOOMMME BAAAAAACCCKKK TOOOOOOOO MOOOUUUURRRN FOOOOOR YOOOUUR TRAAAAGIIC LOSSS FROOOOOOOOOOM THEEEEEEEEEEE IIINVAAAAAAASIOOOOOON FROOOOM SOOOOOO LOOOOONG AGOOOOOOOO!"

She peeked around surreptitiously while letting loose a few more agonized screams. No Claymores, but the security was coming for her. Ah, they were having trouble with the gate. Only Undine would weld a gate shut, chain it with enough chains to outfit every tire on every car in the lodge, and add a hair-trigger bomb set to blow the shit out of anyone who tried to open it.

She'd probably hotwired the lift, too.

"THEEEEEEYYYY LEEEVEEEELED THIIIIIIS BEEAAAUUUUTIFUUUUL CIIIITTYYYYY!"

She risked another surreptitious peek. Nope. Still not there. She caught sight of the video recorder Deneve had set up in a tree. Damn. One of the security guards tried to climb over the fence and was electrocuted. Definitely Undine's work, then. It was time to improvise.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!"

Yep, the spoiled rich brats were trying in vain to block their ears from the noise. Helen smirked at their discomfort. The other Claymores were probably laughing their heads off listening to her, too. A soft whupping noise caught her attention.

She looked up; it was a news helicopter. Helen took a step to get out of the way so no one could pinpoint her as the perpetrator of the amazing vocal display- compliments of the house- and put her weight directly on a slick ice patch.

"EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEK!" _chink_. Her last, high pitched shriek had broken both the speakers and the lodge's glass windows. Helen appreciated the equally panicked shrieks from the rich vacationers as they ran to salvage their items- the ones that weren't glass- from her position face-planted into a tree. Pine, probably.

Gingerly rubbing her bruised nose, which had taken most of the impact going down, Helen stomped her way purposefully through the trees until she reached the bottom, where the other Claymores were waiting.

"So?"

"We dug up the wrong hill," Undine said. "Some loser security people heard your screeching and fell down on their way to try to stop you, so we gave them first aid and left. That hole must have been at least fifty feet."

Oh, it was a wonder what five Claymores with shovels could do when they put their minds on something.

"Do you have a special double-shovel technique like you did with your swords?" Helen asked, since Undine seemed to be carrying an extra.

"You have no idea," Deneve said. At that point, Helen noticed that the other four were splattered with large quantities of dirt and debris, while Undine was virtually spotless. The video camera was the only other clean thing.

"Your turn next," Helen reminded her teammate vindictively. "I'd start polishing up my armor if I were you."

"As soon as I post your antics on the forum," Deneve retorted blandly.

"Damn. Touche."

"Ooh, can't wait to see this."

"Shut up, muscle-freak."

**(insert line break here) **

Done! Finally! I hope you don't hate it, Useful Oxymoron.

Next chapter: FTW!?


End file.
